Knitting was a lot harder than she had expected and now that Hermione, who had once done a rather terrible job at it, was much more advanced, Ellie couldn't help but shout in frustration and throw her knitted hat down by the fire. She had never been a fan of Hermione and seeing her do better than her was incredibly irritating and embarrassing.
"Ellie!" said Hermione, leaping off her armchair to pick up Ellie's horribly knitted hat from the ground. The Muggle-born threw it into her lap before taking a seat. "You need to be patient. Honestly, it's not that hard. All you need is patience and practice. Oh - are you knitting a stocking?"
"No - it - it's a hat. It's meant to be a hat," Ellie grumbled, flicking her knitted hat away, disinterested. "Couldn't we use magic to knit these?"
Hermione turned away, her eyebrows raised as her eyes stared hard at her knitted work. "No. No I don't think so. It's better this way, trust me."
Ellie smirked. "You don't know how."
"I didn't say that. It's just better this way. House-elves are already surrounded by enough magic as it is, the least you and I can do is knit without any. Don't you agree? It's honestly heart-breaking."
"If you say so," Ellie sighed carelessly, picking up what she could now see as a stocking. She frowned and prodded it with her wand. When her mind was not focused on the knitting, her hand couldn't keep itself from reaching up to the necklace from Nikolai.
Hermione saw this and said, "that looks nice."
"It does, doesn't it?"
"Although I don't think I need to ask who it's from. All the girls are talking about it. You and that Slytherin Nikolai apparently dating. Is it true? Please tell me that's just a promise ring. No - no - not like that, I don't like him like that, I don't like anybody like that actually . . . just you're quite young."
"It's just a gift," Ellie replied, and tucked the necklace under shirt. "Silas said something to me today. When we free all these House-elves, who will do all the cleaning and cooking? Filch can't clean everything on his own and if he was given the chance to cook for all the students he'd poison us all."
Hermione kept her chin high as she said, "I'm sure Dumbledore will have something figured out when all the House-elves are gone. It's unacceptable behavior to treat these creatures like slaves."
"Have you ever thought that maybe the House-elves don't want to be freed? You should really go and talk to them before freeing them; they might not be too happy about being freed. At my home I have servants that are Squibs and they certainly wouldn't like to be fired. They need their job and my home is their home. Freeing is firing."
"Why does everyone keep saying that?" Hermione exclaimed. "Of course they want to be freed! This is slave labour!"
Ellie looked hopelessly down at her failed knitted hat. She threw it on the arm of the chair beside Hermione. "I would've liked to learn knitting for the elves but I don't know anymore. I can't knit and freeing is firing. Sorry. I'm out."
Hermione said nothing as Ellie passed her and, when the redhead turned to look over her shoulder, she saw the back of the Muggle-borns slumped shoulders and bushy head staring down at her lap. Before she could allow the guilt to press into her, she spun around and dashed up to her dormitory.
Her bed was more than a welcoming sight and she automatically threw herself face down, burying it deep against her plump pillow. She thought about Nikolai and pictured the wedding in her mind, the way she wanted it to be and the way she knew it would actually turn out to be. His views about anyone other than himself were slightly expected, but Silas had helped her, so maybe she could help Nikolai.
It couldn't be too hard to let him in on what he was missing out on.
"Nikolai! Hey!" she called after him the next day. He turned around by the great oak doors by the Great Hall with raised eyebrows, apparently shocked that she sought him out instead of the other way around. "How are you?"
"Super," he said slowly. "How are you?"
"Good. Where is everyone? Your . . . friends . . . I haven't seen Silas anyway either."
"Ah. You think my friends are holding Silas hostage and you won't see him again until after we're married."
Ellie paled and her tongue caught in her throat. Nikolai raised a delicate brow.
"That was my attempt at a joke," he added. "He's probably in the library studying or in his dormitory. Like mine - they're all in the Slytherin common room getting a move on with their OWL studies. Draco and Pansy have been working on their Prefect duties . . . I still think I should've been a Prefect, Draco's a terrible Prefect."
"I don't doubt you," said Ellie, rolling her eyes. "You would've made a wonderful Prefect. You might even make Head Boy!"
Nikolai smiled and held his arm out for her to take. "Let's walk."
"Where? And I hope you know that we'll be in trouble if one of our teachers spots us not using our free time wisely."
"I'm already excelling, they're doubtlessly aware of that. Now that we're alone without an audience, tell me something," he said politely, Ellie took his arm and they began to walk.
"Tell you something?" she blinked.
"Yes. About you. I don't want to hear about any of that Muggle career nonsense either."
"Er - ok," she said, suddenly frightened that she might not be able to open his eyes just as Silas had opened hers. Her parents were not very fond of Muggles, Muggle-borns and Squibs, but Silas made sure to knock that out of her, what if she couldn't do the same for Nikolai? "I like to draw. And paint."
"Draw and paint? Like what?"
"Like - anything. Flowers, trees, the sky, buildings, people, portraits. I've attempted drawing this castle but it looked more like the shrieking shack . . ."
"Are you any good?" he asked her. "You should look at me when I talk to you. It's rude to stare at the ground while I'm talking. I thought your parents taught you manners."
Ellie froze for a second and fought the urge to argue with him, instead deciding to clear her throat and mind, and turn to look Nikolai dead in his brown eyes.
"Yes," she said, in a strong, somber voice. "I am good."
He only smiled, which irked her slightly. She held her stare. "Good. You should draw me. Come on."
"Where are we going?"
"To my common room."
The way Nikolai said my suggested that in his mind he thought he owned the entirety of Slytherin.
"Er - how am I meant to draw you if we're headed to your common room? I haven't got my drawing kit. Nikolai - stop dragging me! This is wrong, I can't go into Slytherin, it isn't right."
"Oh, come on. We'll go to your common room, you can grab your things, then we'll head back down to my common room and we can sit in my dormitory. I'll make sure no one comes in to disturb us," he smiled, pulling her into another direction. Ellie cried out from the force of his grasp, but she wasn't sure he heard or noticed it from how excited he seemed. "You don't need to worry about coming into Slytherin. Your whole family were Slytherins, you're meant to be in Slytherin. Besides, no one will care that you're in there if you're with me."
"Nikolai . . . I don't want to go in there," she told him as he pulled her up the marble stairs. "And going to Gryffindor then back down to Slytherin? That's an awful lot of walking. We can just . . . sit in the library."
"No way, Elyssa. You're going to see the House you're meant to be in."
"Yeah - but - I don't want to. I'm in Gryffindor, I don't care for Slytherin," she argued.
"And I don't care that you don't want to; you need to," he argued back. There was something about the look he'd given her; it wasn't in his face, but when she saw the slight crease in his delicate eyebrows, it masked the entire politeness on his face and made him look . . . angry.
Ellie fought against a groan and looked at the bright side; while she drew him in Slytherin, she could take her time and hopefully talk sense into him. She was starting to feel as though she could tolerate Pansy more than Nikolai, and that was terrible. Pansy was terrible. And if Pansy was terrible, what was Nikolai?